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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Sallent, post: 2890274, member: 76194&quot;]Sweet Liberalitas reverse. Liberalitas on coins is thought to commemorate a gift of money given by the emperor to his troops, which was basically a bribe to keep your loyal troops from accidentally plunging a knife into your back, or slitting your throat. It appears that the Praetorian Guards, and increasingly the legions themselves, were very accident prone with their emperors, but emperors soon caught on to the fact that the more bribe money &quot;donatives&quot; that they gave to their soldiers, the lesser these accidental stabbings and slitting of throats seemed to happen.</p><p><br /></p><p>The emperors did tend to give gifts of money to citizens too at the same time the army got theirs, but no doubt the propaganda of Liberalitas at this time period was aimed at the soldiers, as donative to the army became a top priority for emperors. Severus started the tradition of focusing on keeping the army bribed and happy, while ignoring the Senate. As long as the army was with you, you could afford not to focus as much on the rest of the population.</p><p><br /></p><p>I have one of Gordian III. Notice mine says LIBERALITAS AVG II. The number II commemorates a second such donation. As emperors gave one when they came to power, and usually one during a major event like a wedding, this one might have been minted for the donative Gordian III would have been expected to give the soldiers to celebrate his imperial wedding. An interesting thing is that we know Gordian III had three such events based on his coin legends. I suspect the third could have been to motivate his soldiers for the upcoming campaign against Parthia. A little cash goes a long way towards making soldiers feel better about marching through the bitter deserts of the Middle East.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]694383[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>And to keep on with the focus on Septimius Severus, here are my coins of his. The first minted in the East probably during the Civil Wars, and the second with the Neptune reverse no doubt commemorates the Emperor&#039;s upcoming crossing of the English channel for his military campaign in Britania. I&#039;m sure Neptune was pleased with being on the coins, because Severus had no issues crossing the channel.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]694384[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]694385[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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